Four Things You Can Learn From Foals – Or Why You Should Hit Train On Monday

Smart is the new sexy. Four life lessons from UK’s hottest math rock band and why they are worth the trip to Train.

School isn’t everything. While the fabulous five met while studying in Oxford, all the band members except for Jimmy Smith (guitar, keyboards) dropped out when the band signed their first record deal with Transgressive in 2006. Smith actually earned a degree in geography (in case you were wondering) – which consequently didn’t leave him with another choice but becoming a rock star.

Don’t believe the hype. Remember the Kooks, and the hype, and one megatrillion little fangirls screaming their lungs out for Luke Pritchard – despite the fact he really just wrote mediocre puberty pop songs? Yeah, luckily these times are over. But it’s not like Yannis Philippakis hadn’t seen it coming. While being a guest at BBC’s comedy panel game “Never Mind The Buzzcocks”, the Foals front singer had to learn that the Kooks had had to stop a concert early because their fans’ dancing had caused ceiling towers to fall on the audience. Philippakis couldn’t believe his ears: “Why would people watching the Kooks be dancing?!” In retrospect, it remains a mystery to us, too.

If you’re unhappy with things, just change them. Sometimes stuff just doesn’t work out like you would have imagined it would. Say you get David Sitek from TV On The Radio to produce your debut album, but the outcome just doesn’t sound like you want. What do you do? Well, if you’re Foals, you just go ahead and remix the whole thing – with an amazing result. Foals happy, fans happy, David Sitek – well, not so happy, but he would eventually get over it.

Never let the bullies win. Even rock stars can be racist thugs, and you shouldn’t just let them get away with it. When Sex Pistols fronstinger John Lydon and his entourage assaulted Kele Okereke (Bloc Party) backstage at Summercase 2008, Foals’ Yannis Phillipakis, together with Kaiser Chiefs’ Ricky Wilson, stepped in – resulting in a sandbagged and handcuffed Phillipakis. Which didn’t stop him from (very subtly) dedicating the performance of “Cassius” to Lydon. Brains: 1, muscle: 0!

Still hungry for more knowledge? Foals will play at Train at 14 October, support: Lou Lou.